Break Away

I will go away far from this place not because I want to leave, but because I need to see new things, feel brand new, and most importantly, know that there are a lot of other things out there. Yes! There could be a lot of things out there. Longing to be touched, to be felt, to be tasted, to be consumed, to be recognized, to be appreciated, to be of importance. I would like to believe, I am not alone in this world.

Lost

The past few months had treated me good and bad at the same time. There had been lots of new things I have tried, as if I was filling up holes in my life, building up walls to strengthen my defense and leaping far beyond to see things I have never seen before. Even so, I had been reluctant to go overboard, to get my other foot out of the mud I've put myself into for far too long that it takes a lot of effort to do so.  I find it hard to completely let go of the things too familiar, like home.

There had been too many memories, dreams, unspoken promises and beliefs to hold on to. Letting go of what used to be is like letting go of the years that molded me, and still molds me. But just like home, time will come when I have to leave. I can look back as often as I’d like to, go back as often as I can, but I should not expect things to be the same as before.

Home, I used to think, should always stay the same, treat you the same. NO. I was wrong to think that. Home, I realized, is not at all familiar. Because the slightest change could make it a thousand times different than before. Then you’ll find yourself lost in a place you thought is yours. And you don’t have any idea where you stand.

I failed. And soon got up.

I was an hour-and-a-half-away from home when my sister asked me to buy bananas on my way home. When I got home at past 8 that night, she was already in bed, sleeping. I put down the bananas on the dining table and went straight to my working table, where a desk lamp is on, the only source of light in the room at night. I turned my laptop on and started reading the PDF Files about cities for a quiz tomorrow. From where I was sitting, I can see my sister’s closed eyes. They seem heavy, with dark circles around. They seem to tell me that they are too tired.

My sister is on training for a call center in Makati. She wakes up early to travel more or less an hour to get to work at 7 AM up until 3PM while also maintaining another ‘part-time’ job in the previous company where she worked full time. She is attending the training for the call center, ‘just so she could have regular monthly income,’ just before she gets out of the country to work in Abu Dhabi. Abu Dhabi… yes, in the Middle East, in Abu Dhabi. What’s in Abu Dhabi? I am scared to know the answer.

I haven’t been asking her about Abu Dhabi. Through eavesdropping, I have known that she’s leaving in March and she’ll be there for only 6 months, but may extend depending on her work performance. I am scared. I am scared of whatever will happen to her there. I want to blame my parents for her leaving, but I can only blame myself.

I am extending my years in school because I failed an architecture course. I feel so weak. I feel so guilty. I feel responsible for every wrong turns that’s happening in her life – especially, not going to Law School, which was her initial plan. I know she will make a good lawyer, but I just robbed her of the opportunity to be one simply by being with her, by depending on her.

And that’s also what I am doing to the most important man in my life. Simply by being with him, I pull him down. That the things I thought were helping him were actually things he feels bad about.

I am not doing a very good job in anything I do. I fail in school, thinking it is more important to spend my time building relationships, making them stronger. But then, just as I thought I was building relationships and making them stronger, I was actually destroying it. As a sister, I have already made the biggest sin of my life – robbing her of her dreams. And for the only reason which makes me hold on to dear life aside for my big dreams, I am nothing but a failure.

What are left of me now are my big dreams. And I can only dream alone. For I cause no good to the people I love the most, who made me dream big, bigger than what I think I am capable of. In return, I gave them disappointments and I constantly fail to make them feel what I want them to feel… loved.

Perhaps not to be is to be without your being

Perhaps not to be is to be without your being,

without your going, that cuts noon light
like a blue flower, without your passing
later through fog and stones,
without the torch you lift in your hand
that others may not see as golden,
that perhaps no one believed blossomed
the glowing origin of the rose,
without, in the end, your being, your coming
suddenly, inspiringly, to know my life,
blaze of the rose-tree, wheat of the breeze:
and it follows that I am, because you are:
it follows from ‘you are’, that I am, and we:
and, because of love, you will, I will,
We will, come to be.

Well, need i say more? For the lack of any other better words, or better skills in combining words such as this, I bow. For this may be mediocrity, borrowing words of someone else to speak for me. I am no Pablo Neruda. But I think in this poem, I am.

Four sachets of coffee today

For the last few nights, I had dreams of attempted murder and rape, of people wanting to take advantage or kill me. But for all those dreams I have successfully saved myself by running away. Without knowing where to go, hoping some place else could be safe... running as fast as my heart would allow me and I can only ask God to make it stronger this time, until I'm light-years away from danger.

The nights are becoming scary for me. And the moment I wake up, I feel restless.

GOAL-SETTING, or something of that sort:

Haven't I told you the end of the road isn't clear for me just yet? One of the goodness of home is that (aside from the really good food and fresh air) you live only with the necessities, with things that really matter the most. It's like a gift without a wrapper, a flower without thorns, a face without make-up, a car without a stereo, a... you get the point. When you live only with the essentials, you tend to see things clearer.

I came up with this list on a whim, while I was idly using this netbook, looking for old stuff as usual. So here's me setting my goals in life, trying to have direction, to have a clearer view of the path I am taking... Of course these goals shall not narrow my mind and blind my intuition. This is only a guide.

In random order...

·         Top the LEA (partly for my sister, partly for myself, and partly for my children)
·         Work as a freelance design architect
·         Study Structural Engineering (preferably not in the Philippines)
·         Study Psychology (perhaps on my own)
·         Paint and draw and watercolor (just hobbies)
·         Run a marathon (the NY marathon)
·         Be a triathlete (or just finish a triathlon)
·         Blog about ‘Bean Sprouts’ open to the public (with pretty picturesJ)
·         Work in an Architectural Research and Development company.
·         Help develop Philippine Architecture
·         Play the piano and the saxophone/any wind instrument (hobbies again)
·         Build my own dream house J
·         Design an auditorium/theater/coliseum (before I… no time limit!)
·         Travel places, discover the world (and taste good food, meet other people)
·         Publish a book (subject pending)
·         Solve environmental problems
·         Have a truly happy family (‘truly happy’ subject to change: can’t think of the right word right now)
·         Grow old with the first and last and only and most important man in my life (everything in this list can go but not this one)

Where’s the positivity gone?

Okay. This blog isn't fun. It is not made for you to read. Who would want to be sad? Who would want to be down reading things about sadness, failure, mistakes and sure-this-isn’t-cheering-me-up stuff? Everyone, aside from you… so thank you for bearing with me. Even though you are the silent audience in this dramatic soliloquy of mine, (who I know would not say a word or give a hand) that you are there on the front seat (or wherever you may be sitting) is more than enough for me.

This blog is too serious for the one who’s writing it. If only you could be with me for one day, or just for a moment, you wouldn’t think that I am the one writing this. Because in real life (or at least the life of me who mingle) I am this person who’s always smiling, who will definitely make your day a little brighter just because I can make you laugh even without knowing what makes you happy, who makes fun of every little thing, who enjoys the things she does and sees, and everyday is a day when I was born and I would die.

But this blog and this person writing all this stuff is someone else. Someone who finds fault in things she used to appreciate and give value to; someone who sees the wilted yellow flower on the side of the road in a bright sun-shiny day and the stain on a clean tablecloth; someone who closes the door to every possible moments of happiness and enjoyment and pleasure and fun just so she could spend her time thinking about how degraded the world has been all through these years. Well, that’s a good thing actually. To think about the deteriorating environment in which we live in everyday of our lives, every moment of breathe and every blink of an eye we see. So let’s replace ‘the world’ with ‘herself.’ But that’s not the point I am trying to make.

My hopes are high, and with fingers crossed, soon the 'me' will come to light. Or that I can be sure, I do what I do because I know what I know. Okay, that alone is confusing. This is just that point in my life where I am trying to figure where the hell I am heading because right now, I can’t see the end of the road.

Fake Paint

Playing with paint brush on a computer mouse.
Need a Wacom pen.
Or a real brush.
...and a lot of time.

The Heart of the Matter

You know the heart is like a motor, the motor of the body. If the heart goes bad, then everything else may.

My heart is trembling. It is pounding, rapidly beating, fluttering… as if it does not belong to me, as if locked inside wanting to come out. Can’t breathe, but not suffocated. There’s too much air to take in, but I am short of it.

I feel so weak, so fragile. I lack strength. I look pale. Not enough blood in my nerves, not enough meat on my bones. I asked myself, “How did I end up here?”

When everything else seems to go wrong, there’s one sure thing you can get right: carry on. But..   

A Birthday To Remember

I have been telling this story for more than thrice now and I thought it is worthy of an entry here in my blog since it is about… my birthday! J

The day started with the sound of a pounding hammer on the side of our house. After trying so hard for many times to fall back to sleep, I finally gave in to the loud and constant pounding, as if pulling me from bed against my own will. So I did get out of bed at past 9 in the morning on the 29^th day of December, and standing in front of the closet mirror, I told the girl who lives there, “Okay. 21 now,” and took a deep breath. As expected, I found myself alone inside that two-storey house, which reminded me to prepare merienda for the workers, since no one else would do that. “Not my job, but fine… It’s my birthday after all.” The four workers kept me company that whole day and I served them some merienda in the morning and in the afternoon. I prepared their merienda with delight and enthusiasm, full of positive thoughts about birthdays and all days that are supposedly joyful and enjoyed, as if I am preparing the food for the guests for my birthday. And as I serve my ‘guests,’ they do not know that today, though for them is just one of the days of a long week’s work, is a special day for me. So there, my first human encounter on my birthday was with the workers, telling them, “Merienda na po kayo.”

Then as I was having my breakfast, Ma, my grandmother, came in with my 4-year old cousin, who wants to sing ‘Tomorrow’ (the only song she knows how to sing on our videoke). After I turned the TV, DVD and speakers on, and keyed in 10520, (My cousin sings the same song for more than 3 times a day for almost a week then so I memorized the videoke number already.)  my grandmother left excusing herself to have breakfast at home. And so I was left with my 4-year old cousin, who I can barely have an actual conversation with, singing ‘Tomorrow’ as I was coaching her the lyrics she can’t pronounce properly giving the phrases  ‘bet you’re your bottom dollar’ and ‘so you gotta hang on’ innocent injustice. It was almost lunch time when she finished her third song and her yaya fetched her to eat lunch/brunch/breakfast. Poor kid, I didn’t know she hasn’t eaten yet!

Anyway, at lunch I decided to cook. The dish was something no one has ever heard of or tasted before. It was tuna with tomatoes and tomato sauce and uncooked rice and water all mixed in the pan. I called it, ‘Food for the Ducks.’ And yes you got it right, after eating some spoonfuls of it, I fed it to the ducks. Then I had sandwich with liver spread for ‘real’ lunch and oh, it was time to serve merienda for the workers so they had the same, sandwich with liver spread plus Four Seasons juice.

It was the time of the day I always associate as the time when maids are stuck on the couch watching their favorite afternoon daily shows, I was there sitting on the couch singing songs on the videoke, with ‘Alone’ as my featured song of the day. ‘And the night goes by so very slow, oh, I hope that it won’t end though, alone.’ Virtually losing my golden voice, I shifted activity to watching HIMYM, stuck on the couch, like the maids in the back of my mind.

Then, someone who does not regularly visit came into our house, what a surprise! It was my grandmother’s sister, who I call, ‘Tita A.’ She asked about our new dining set, how much it was and when it was bought, then that decorative plant holder in the kitchen counter, and the round fruits on the table (if we already got 12 of those, and said she needed two more; this is a New Year’s thing) and then she asked for ‘makakain’ so I gave her some bread I found inside the ref and some fruits on the table. And that was it. She left not knowing what day it was or so I figured.

And then, finally, someone remembered my birthday! As I was looking from our door to the street, there was ‘Manang,’ our laundrywoman, with her apo, properly dressed as if to face people in a decent occasion, approaching our house. She knew it was the 29^th of December and she knew it was my birthday! How thoughtful is she to remember that special day of the year! They came in and Manang greeted me ‘Happy birthday,’ the first personal greeting I received that day. But after finding out I had no party and no food is to be served, they went home disappointed perhaps for the futile effort of dressing up and walking from their house all the way to ours.

Not taking the day too personal and convincing myself I chose it to be this way, I was back on the couch, eyes fixed on the TV, but mind wandering elsewhere. I was thinking of... uh... I was thinking.

And just like that, it was dinner time. The workers were gone now; they left at 5, as they do everyday. And too lazy to cook again for the ducks, or for myself, I just bought sardines for dinner and got back on the couch to watch and wished for the day to end more quickly. I just wanted to sleep so that it’ll all be over – the loneliness, the absence of personal greetings, people coming but not knowing it’s your birthday, people who don’t know it’s my special day, the lack of balloons and cakes and foods that comfort you, the surprise guests you’re not suppose to anticipate, the absence of the most important people in your life and most of all, the emotions inside me I can’t seem to feel right about or understand. But really, other than that, I was fine.

And just as the day was about to end, my mother came in and greeted me with a big smile on her face and a ‘Happy Birthday, anak.’ I know she wasn’t suppose to go home that day because tomorrow’s not a holiday. She took a leave from work so that she can be there on my birthday. She forgot her phone in the office because she was, perhaps aside from being forgetful, in a hurry, so she can be there before I get in bed. And she did, she was there on my birthday! Though she texted me that morning to buy cake and ice cream and use the money she gave me the day before, I decided not to, for the lack of people to share it with. She asked if I already had dinner, and she figured out what I had. 

They say, ‘Mothers know and understand without you having to say it,’ and though I didn't say a word, we were communicating. Even if I don’t understand what it is I am feeling, she knows exactly what it is. She went out for a while to borrow a phone charger from my tito, who lives near our house. When she came back, my grandmother and my 4-year old cousin, my tito’s and tita’s came in the house to greet me. How awkward, I thought, what my mother have done. How awkward, I thought, for these people to be there who knew to themselves that they had totally forgotten and was only reminded that today is my day. How awkward, I thought, to sing Happy Birthday on videoke, when they all think I had the day and the house and all the things within all to myself, alone. And that it wasn't so much of a happy day.

My mother tried to make things lighter and easier for me to bear. She tried to celebrate with me that special day of the year by reminding the people who has forgotten and giving me foods that provide comfort, watching HIMYM with me, opening a bottle of wine, giving me my birthday gift, and all the things that she could probably do to make me feel good. I was fine, really. Except that it was my birthday.

The road is full of impatient people.

Last night, I was walking along the highway going to the university near our subdivision. Everyone who knows how to drive knows that a double yellow line in the middle of the road means ‘NO OVERTAKING.’ I have learned that before I even learned how to drive. I have no watch or a phone at that time but the cars on the road suggest that it is about dinner time and everyone’s tired and hungry and all they want now is just to get home as soon as possible. People nowadays, are always in a hurry. They don’t care about violating a law, like overtaking when overtaking isn’t allowed, just as they violate any other laws, just as long as they do what they have to do… hurry up and get to the next moment.

I used to believe about making moments right and not waiting for the right moment. My high school motto was ‘Don’t wait for the right moment, make the moment right.’ But I realized that there really is such a thing as a right moment or a right time. There’s a right time to overtake a car so that accidents won’t happen. There’s a right time to have sex because you’ll know better in time, and yes, also to avoid accident. There’s a right time to bear a child so that your genes are perfectly passed on. There’s a right time to feed a child solid foods so that the child won’t choke. There’s a right time to speak of truth or of lies, so that it is easier or less hurting to accept and believe. There’s a right time to reap a fruit from a tree so that its taste is as perfect as can be. There’s a right time to stop waiting so that you can focus to attend to more important things in your life.

There are moments in life that you cannot have control over. You may, but the outcome won’t be as good as when you have just waited for the right time. If we can only be patient and learn that if we wait for that right time, we can have things at its best. And hopefully, there will be less accidents on the road.

By the moonlight

By the moonlight I see the lines

Too familiar that it reminds me

Of things I’ve had and lost

Of moments I’ve lived and forgotten

Of days I will never relive

Of nights of silence and noise

When all is gone and nothing is left

But the mind trying to see

Many has been lost

Many has been shattered

Just by not looking back

And seeing things from afar

By looking too far ahead

been blind to what is near

By looking too far ahead

been blind to see me

By the moonlight I surrender

By the moonlight I asked again

The nights I missed

The words I failed to hear

The touches I failed to feel

The beauty I failed to see

Why not? It's Sunday.

Today, i woke up, ate breakfast, went to church, walked about a kilometer to get to Starbucks, had a tall latte, sit there for three hours staring at nowhere, let my mind wander to the past and the future, and intentionally did not attend to the here and now, walked the same distance to get home, brushed my teeth, watched a movie while eating wheat bread, pichi pichi, craisins and coffee, stayed idly in bed for about half an hour until i fell asleep, got woken up after i don't know how long and realized that today, i wasn't alone.

There's a lot in not knowing

At exactly 9:51 pm, I dialed his number on my phone but decided it was a bit early; they may have just landed and ended it before it even rang. “I’ll call later,” I said to myself. At 9:54, my phone rang, he was calling me. He may not have called me right after landing, but he did right after they got outside the airport, and I can only wish I was there waiting for them as I talk to him over the phone. Looking at the picture on my phone’s screen, I was smiling when I pressed ’answer’. My sweet voice, as he said, cannot hide the truth of missing him, of longing for this time when I can finally talk to him, though it had only been four days since the last time we heard each other’s voice. The call lasted only for three minutes. And that was, by far, the most (insert adjective) three-minute phone call of my life. I can’t insert a word that would perfectly capture the way I would describe it, or how I felt. Just before those three minutes ended, I go t the chance to hear everyone else’s voice, most especially Enzo. Then they said goodbye. And so did I.

I don’t know how a call would end so happily that it made me almost cry. And as I write this, I am trying so hard to keep my eyes open so that tears won’t fall out. And I couldn’t be more convinced that I have already found the love of my life.

Not so lucky day

I woke up at 6am today beside my boyfriend, feeling the heat of his body against mine. I placed my hand on his forehead to feel if he still has fever and the unusually high temperature affirmed. I got out of bed to prepare him breakfast – oatmeal, as he requested but ended up eating it myself because he “doesn’t want to make me his mother” and he prepared his own oatmeal/coffee and bread for breakfast. After finishing my cup of oatmeal, I took a bath and prepared my things and myself for school. I bid my goodbyes first to Ate Dindi, who was then going to take a bath, then to the married couple Ate Nica and Marvin, then to the cutest little boy on Earth, Enzo and lastly, to my dearest beb. I have made my goodbye kisses (yes, with es) to him intentionally noticeable and perceptible to who’s inside the apartment, especially to Enzo, who then went outside as I walked away from the screen door and said, “Gah, gah.. kiss.”(Gah is Girl in adult human language) I run back to him and kissed him goodbye.

The new shoes I am wearing starts to hurt my right foot and I can’t walk as fast as before. Good thing, despite the slow walking, I got in the train just a bit past 8. As I walked out of the elevator at Buendia Station, the train was already there, doors open and so I rushed in. The train was full today, unlike the days before. Getting off at Quezon Avenue Station, the line of people taking the train going up north was unbelievably long, from the security check to the ground floor, which was two return stairs high. I wonder if there’s a bus strike today. I had a hard time going down the stairs as my shoes slips off my right foot, but then I managed to get on to the UP Campus jeep and arrive at my class earlier than my professor.

As I sit right smack at the center isle at the back most portion of the room, my professor came in, greeted us ‘Hello’, turned on the light and put out the chalk, readings and the seat arrangement from his black back pack bag. He then looked at me, seemingly amazed and confused at the same time about this student right in front of him and said in his gay voice, “I didn’t see you last time,” to which I replied, “I was absent last time.” I didn’t see it coming, him noticing someone in his class is absent given his unstoppable train of thoughts expressed with an overly unmanly conviction.

When I got to the library after my second class, the librarian lectured me again about returning reserve books properly. Apparently, my senility attacked me again last Friday when I left the book I borrowed from the reserve section on the table, which means they have my ID. It was the second time I have done that and I was told so and also about my liability just in case it got lost or something. I apologized, and now I am writing this blog.

I just received a text message from my beb saying that he’s feeling better now and eating honey oat loaf. The day has not ended yet, maybe it’s not an unlucky one at all… I still have 12 hours to go.